Zeeland to stage 'Wintervention' Jan. 25 | Community Spirit

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ZEELAND, Mich.—Zeeland is staging a Wintervention Jan. 25, even if the weather doesn’t cooperate.

This is the fourth year for Wintervention, although the festival has been canceled the past two years because of a lack of snow in Zeeland and/or competing cities. To avoid the same problem this year, organizers have added more events that are not reliant on snow.

Wintervention’s main event is a snowman building competition. In the festival’s inaugural year, the Zeeland community created 268 snowmen in 120 minutes, earning them second place among three competitors. The City of Saline took the title with 483 snowmen built.

This year, five cities are competing for the title of Snowman Making Champion, including Zeeland, St. Clair, Saline, Three Rivers and Douglas. Each city will have up to two hours to build 4-6 foot tall snowmen. No power equipment can be used and no more than 50 people can be building at a time. In Zeeland, plastic molds will be available on site again this year, but participants are asked to bring their own shovels, as well as items to dress the snowmen in after the competition.